Birmingham City Council has been left without a functioning finance system until at least 2026, according to a 66-page report from external auditors Grant Thornton.
The report into the failed Oracle Fusion enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementation at the council said the overall cost to put things right will be £90m in excess of the original budget.
It all means that the council has not had a proper financial management and cash receipts system for more than two years. It has also been unable to produce reliable financial reports and account for income and spending. The failures in turn contributed to the council’s de facto bankruptcy in 2023.
Grant Thornton said when the decision to go live was taken in April 2022 “the level of risk inherent in the Oracle solution was not properly understood. This resulted in the implementation failing at a significant cost to the council contributing to a breakdown of financial control such that it has been unable to adequately control its finances throughout 2022/23, 2023/24 and into 2024/25.”
Adding: “The governance and programme management for the Oracle programme had fundamental weaknesses that were never effectively reminded and were further exposed by high turnover of staff un both senior and operational roles.”
